Sr Winnie Shiu, President of the Hong Kong Institute of Surveyors (HKIS), has come first multiple times in her career and personal life. As the HKSAR Government’s first female Chief Land Surveyor and the first female President of the HKIS from the Land Surveying Division, Sr Shiu has a can-do attitude that is evident not only from her professional achievements but also from her dedication to the Institute.
Driving force behind the Coronavirus Dashboard
It was the first day of the Chinese New Year when Shiu, on vacation abroad, sent a text message in her HKIS capacity to a core government official proposing the setting up of a coronavirus interactive map dashboard for the public to access anti-epidemic information. “I wanted to give it a try. Just as the global Ebola crisis had been effectively contained by the use of a Geographic Information System (GIS), I hoped that we as surveyors could help the Hong Kong community.”
Shiu’s message prompted an urgent government mission involving identification of key personnel across bureaux and departments during the public holidays and interdepartmental meetings immediately after offices reopened. Racing against time and working around the clock for three days during the weekend, the workgroup launched the online platform displaying quarantine sites and other information by 9:30pm on Monday, 3 February.
“The biggest challenge was time. We had to solicit requirements, set workflow, write programmes for facilitating automatic data retrieval, ensure timely updates from the data providers and conduct test runs before uploading the data to the Dashboard. We had to do all these timely,” said Shiu. It was the first time the Hong Kong Government had generated an interactive map dashboard.
Once launched, the dashboard soon received over 1,000,000 view counts. It didn’t take long for news about the dashboard, jointly developed by the Development Bureau, the Lands Department and volunteer GIS experts from the Smart City Consortium, to spread swiftly in the city. With enhancements, the view count has now exceeded 10,000,000 as of its’ one month’s anniversary on 2 March.
Woman in a male-dominated profession
This is but one of the many incidents in which Shiu has manifested her motto, “Dare to Dream, Dare to Be”. “In a male-dominated profession, I was the only one out of the three female students in the university to continue pursuing surveying. Currently the Chair of Commission 1 -- Professional Standards and Practice and Advisory Committee of Commission Officers Representative of the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG), whose mission includes promoting women in surveying, I aspire to address the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal No. 2 on gender equality, which is an issue in developing countries. There might be occasions when our career development is affected, but I have been more fortunate in Hong Kong.”
As the first female in her family to join a profession, Shiu later became the first female land surveyor recruited from abroad by the Hong Kong Government, the first female Senior Land Surveyor and then Chief Land Surveyor. Within the HKIS she was the first female office bearer back in 1997. She was also the first female land surveyor to represent the HKSAR Government in the Chinese Society for Geodesy, Photogrammetry and Cartography (CSGPC), as well as the first female from Hong Kong to be on the Board of Directors of FIG Foundation and to be Chair of a Commission in FIG. She became the first female land surveyor to acquire the Construction Industry Council Certified BIM Manager title. When she served formerly as the first female Principal of the Civil Service’s Survey Training School, her class of land surveying graduates was the first to have all its members achieve success the first time when taking Part One of the professional qualifying examination.
Committed to excellence
Shiu’s resilience was shown early in life. With a passion for the outdoors, she chose the University of East London’s BSc (Hons) in Surveying and Mapping Sciences, one of the UK’s top programmes. Upon graduation, she was hired first by JA Story and Partners for land, aerial and engineering surveys and then by Mason Land Surveys to specialise in GIS. Her promising performance led to a 25 per cent pay rise in the first year and a further 50 per cent increase in the second year even before earning her professional qualification with the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS).
“The experience in the UK meant a lot of hard work and all- round training. Because of the tight timeframe as well as the inaccessibility and remoteness of many of the sites, our two-person team often had to go camping, eating chocolate to keep warm and unable to shower for a couple of days. We carried all our equipment and hiked overnight to catch satellite signals and kick off tasks in early morning.”
Joining the Hong Kong Government in the early 1990s, Shiu served in various departments, including Housing, Lands and Civil Engineering and Development. Significant projects she worked on included the highly popular Centamap, which was the first time the Government promoted Mapping Information Services through the Internet for the community’s use. To this day, Centamap is still used as a key tool and source of information for professionals in the real estate and construction industries. She also played a pivotal role in catalysing the building of much-needed public housing by developing integration of BIM and GIS workflow to speed up calculations during the feasibility study stage regarding the number of residential units possible in a given site, and by developing 3D models to enhance decision-making throughout the planning, design, construction, as-built and maintenance stages. With successful bidding for financial resources, she successfully replaced the Government’s ageing hydrographic survey vessel to meet today’s work requirements.
Currently Head of the Spatial Data Office of the Development Bureau, Shiu is leading various departments in launching Hong Kong’s first Common Spatial Data Infrastructure by 2022. The one-stop spatial data portal will facilitate various industries to develop map-based applications, and enable members of the public to make decisions based on real-time location-based information. These will range from locating car parking space to accessing census data, assessing risks of infectious diseases, opening shops based on foot traffic, learning about waiting times at hospital emergency departments etc. It will be a major milestone in Hong Kong’s smart city development.
Lifelong learning
“Always keep up to date with industry knowledge, and never stop learning even if you are holding a high position,” Shiu remarked. Take unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or drones for instance. Since the Government sponsors those on operational need become trained UAV pilots, she decided to take a course on her own in her spare time to learn about the theories of navigating drones. And as she joined senior management, she did post-graduate studies in Public Administration and Development to better equip herself.
Her keys to success are manifold. “Establish your personal branding. Know your mission. Be authentic and trust your intuition. Explore the external barriers and find solutions. Have confidence in yourself. Most importantly, be courageous and determined.”
Shiu is a great champion of time management. “You can always find time for what is important. Lack of time is just an excuse.” She added, half-jokingly, “And no matter how busy I am, I always find time for the facial spa.”
It is perhaps surprising that Shiu still finds time for regular volunteer work. Participating in three volunteer teams in the past decade, she visits the elderly and the disabled, mentors students, and prepares handmade gifts for the needy. “It was extremely gratifying when the elderly recognised me right away the second year I visited. High school students in the Life Buddies Mentoring Scheme came up with great ideas when we flew drones together, debated about conservation and development and talked about life goals.”
She also finds time for reading, one of her favourite activities, and recommends the book The First Estates by Roger Nissim to fellow surveyors. “It is about how the projects Fairview Park and Hong Lok Yuen, Hong Kong’s first estates with bungalows, came into being in the 1970s and 1980s. Exploring this in relation to the changing socio- economic environment and housing development, Nissim demonstrates that leadership skills, management expertise and thoughtfulness are important in going the extra mile. Some readers say they are happy to see the tree of his long-term labour bear fruit and many look forward to the incalculable influence this book will have in the future. The book is definitely inspiring for surveyors and other professionals alike.”
Missions for HKIS
Shiu takes all her roles with full commitment, so she naturally has strong visions for the Institute. “As a member of CSGPC and FIG, I aspire to foster the Mainland and international ties of our Institute. Greater efforts should be made to promote gender equality and sustainable development. The Institute should enhance its role as an advisor to the Government. Internally, we need to nurture a sense of togetherness amongst divisions by launching Institute-wide awards and professional development schemes. That includes the HKIS’s first Best Development and Conservation Award as well as planned leadership training for young surveyors.”
And Sr Shiu’s advice to young surveyors: “Learn and gain as much exposure as you can, and do not work solely for the purpose of monetary rewards. Knowledge is something no one can take away from you. Become a fellow member so that you can contribute to the Institute as office bearers in the future.”
